


Once a year

by DieAstra



Category: Gotham (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-10
Updated: 2017-04-10
Packaged: 2018-10-17 10:14:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10591902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DieAstra/pseuds/DieAstra
Summary: Alfred sits and drinks and thinks of his regrets and guilt.





	

Once a year, Alfred allowed himself to go to a very dark place. A place that he feared and craved at the same time.

Once a year, he didn’t battle the memories. He welcomed and embraced them.

They didn’t talk about it. Not anymore. Bruce just excused himself, retired early for the night and left Alfred alone with his drink and his demons.

Earlier in the day, when pottering around the house hadn’t been enough to occupy his mind, he’d gone down to the secret shooting range to let off some steam. He always kept the armory well stocked and cleaned and shot his way through various weapons. He didn’t need to think then. He was only focusing at aiming and pulling the trigger. Over and over and over again. Controlling his breathing. Allowing his mind to go numb. He liked the feeling of hard cold steel warming in his hands. The satisfaction of a target well hit. 

But now, sitting alone in the dark, swirling the Scotch in the glass, he couldn’t avoid thinking about it anymore. He leaned back and closed his eyes as the memories started to float in.

How the message of the assault had reached him. How he’d hastily driven to the alley to collect Bruce from the clutches of the police. How Bruce had run up to him. How he hadn’t managed the tiniest word of comfort because it would have meant coming too close to losing it right there and then and punching someone and he couldn’t allow that. Not with little Bruce right beside him who was his responsibility now from one moment to the next. He’d never felt as utterly forlorn before.

This hadn’t been the first loss in his life of course. Being a soldier meant that inevitably you would lose people. Co-workers, mates, dear friends even. You bottled it up and moved on. That’s what you did when there was a war to fight. More important things at stake than your feelings. You dealt with them later. Or never. Alfred was one of the guys who preferred the latter. No use crying over spilled milk.

Every soldier had to learn this the hard way. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be in the force very long.

But this was different. This was at home. It happened to civilians that had done nothing more dangerous than simply walking down a street. Civilians that he’d considered his family. His only family.

Once a year, his mind relentlessly replayed the conversation Alfred had had earlier that evening with Mr. Wayne. It would have been his duty to drive them to the theatre and fetch them again some hours later. In the meantime, he would see to it that Bruce got his dinner and bath.

But then the plans had been changed when Bruce had wanted to come along and the family went to the cinema instead. Mr. Wayne thought this was a good opportunity to give Alfred an evening off, as it rarely happened. Alfred knew better than to object. If Thomas Wayne had made up his mind, there was nothing that could be done to convince him otherwise.

So he had just wished them a nice evening and had decided to check out the new art gallery that held a special event that night. He had planned on recommending it to the Waynes later if he found it to his taste.

Thomas had been much more than his employer. Over the years he had become a good friend. They had met at a tour of duty in the Middle East where Alfred had managed to save his life. Certain events that were a whole other can of worms as far as loss went in Alfred’s past had led him to accept the offered job as a butler, housekeeper, cook and also bodyguard at Wayne Manor.

In the days after the murder, he had just functioned. He had felt a bit overwhelmed with the sudden responsibility of caring for a child and had done his best to convince Bruce that it had not been his fault. There was nothing he could have done. He was just a child. Bruce usually scoffed at that and insisted that he should have done something, anything. Then he stormed away in another stupid attempt to get himself hurt or killed. Survivor’s guilt at its finest.

But nobody ever asked how Alfred felt. How guilty. How it was eating away at him, keeping him awake many nights. Bruce could not have done anything, but if Alfred had been there he would have jumped into the line of fire and tackled that bloody bastard. Hell, if he had been there nothing would have happened in the first place as they all would have been safe inside the car, speeding away.

Intellectually, Alfred knew that this had been no ordinary mugging and that if the killer hadn’t succeeded at the time, he may have found another way eventually.

But still… If only… He knew it was dangerous and self-destroying to think such thoughts. He needed to find a way to deal with it and he did, eventually. Now the darkness only returned once a year, at the date it had happened.

Outside, the darkness gave way to the first light. He finished his drink which hadn’t been the first tonight but Alfred was old and responsible enough to not get pissed anymore like he had in his youth.

He stood, automatically scanning the room to see whether anything was amiss or needed fixing. Once again he was the efficient butler, ready to tackle the new day.

Perhaps one day he would be able to toast his dead friends without regrets.

Today had not been this day.

Perhaps next year.

 

The End


End file.
